Carnival Fun

The first night of the conference we had a family carnival. We all had a great time. The kids started out with a bouncy playscape.

Then it was on to the pony ride.

Isabella wanted to try the bungee trampolines. She really wanted to do a back flip but couldn't quite figure out how to do it. She still had a great time jumping really high.

Next they tried the rock wall.

Isabella talked Liza in to riding the bullet with her. I can say that she enjoyed in much more than her mother did. :-)

Church, then Fun at the splash park

This summer in For Collins has been jam packed with classes, conference meetings, and fun too. The kids had a great time in the Kids Care "school" and also doing some other fun things.
We tried 3 different churches while we were here and ended up going twice to Mountain View Community Church. The second time we were there, all the kids came out to sing some of the songs they had learned in Vacation Bible School. Our kids were not in the VBS, but they got to sing for the church anyway. Here is a little video of them doing the song. Isabella is on the far left in a pink dress, and Zach is in his orange Longhorn's outfit on the right side.

We also enjoyed going to the Canyon Vista park where there is the most amazing play scape I've ever seen, a splash pad, and this very cool red spinny thing. Isabella loved it.

Here's Zach on the biggest kid's swing ever.

Here is Hannah, our niece, and the kids playing at the splash pad.

New friends

Isabella and Zach have made new friends while out here this summer. Here are just a couple...

Here is Zach playing "light savers" with the boys, Jackson and Zachory. They had a lot of fun playing starwars and scooters over the last few weeks.

Isabella and Anna Kate coloring with color wonder. They'll miss each other greatly.

Pictures from today's trip to Rocky Mountain National Park

Today we drove up past Estes Park to the Rocky Mountain National Park. We went to meet some friends of ours from Houston who now live in Denver. They made a great dinner for us and we had lots of fun hanging out, talking and taking pictures.

If you click on the photo below, it will take you to a web album with lots of pictures from the day.

Rocky Mountain Nat'l Park

Pony ride

Today after school we dropped by the local supermarket to take a quick pony ride. At Walmart these cost a quarter, but not at the super discount store. No sir. Here it costs one shiny penny. Can't beat that. :-)

Random stuff from Fort Collins

I thought I'd do a quick catchup from Fort Collins.... I've got a few pictures from different things over the last week... first is a picture of my coaching group for the Leadership Track. Finch, to my left, is our coach. The rest, from left to right is Marc, me, Kevin and Phil. We've had a good time learning lots of new stuff and getting to know each other.


Here was what I thought looked like a kid zoo. I heard lot's of noise coming from the landing above our front door and when I went out and looked up, I saw this gaggle of little kids. They were all up at our upstairs neighbor's apartment.

A couple of days ago we went just across the street so the kids could ride their new scooters and they decided it would be more fun to climb a tree...

We've discovered that with no TV in the house, the kids can come up with all kinds of ways to entertain themselves....

More from the 4th of July

Here are a few more pictures from our 4th of July trip to Colorado Springs.

There was a big slide that the kids went down 4 or 5 times. They loved it. We tried it out too.

Here is Isabella touching the frozen ice of the "North Pole" that was out in front of Santa's house.

Zach and Liza on the merry go round. Isabella was riding on Rudolph, so Zach named his horse "Freddy."

Isabella and Liza rode the mini roller coaster. Isabella loved it. Zach would have nothing to do with it. He didn't really even like watching them ride it.

The last ride they got to ride that day was the little ferris wheel. After that, it really started pouring and the ligntening and thunder came. It was at that point that we decided it would be fun to drive to the top of Pike's Peak.

I posted the videos of driving down the mountain in the ice storm, but tonight I downloaded the pictures from my camera and thought I'd post this fun one from our trip up the mountain driving through the very thick clouds...

Fireworks on the 3rd

On the 3rd of July we went out to a local fireworks stand and got some fireworks. We were going to buy them, but after the lady tried for 15 min to get the credit card to work, she finally just said, "Here, take them." and sent us on our way with out having to pay. Nice!

When we got home we lit some smoke bombs, did some "poppers" that the kids throw down and make pop and then did sparklers.

Here is Zach and Liza in a self portrait while watching from the porch.

Isabella really liked doing the sparklers. Zach, however, did not. He doesn't really like any of them yet, but he was happy to watch from the porch.

Horsetooth Reservoir

Just west of Fort Collins up just a ways in to the mountains is Horsetooth Reservoir. The kids could see the mountains, but we hadn't been up in to them at all after a week here in Colorado, so on the 27th we decided to go up to the lake for lunch.

They loved driving up the mountain and looking out over the lake. Here are a few cut pictures from that day...

Wipeout

The kids have a new favorite show this summer. It is "Wipeout" on NBC (though we watch it on NBC.com since we don't have a TV out in Colorado this summer.) They love watching all the different obstacle courses and really get behind their chosen contestant. The love the "big balls" and hate the "Sucker Punch Wall" (the pic just below.)

Above you can see the big balls.

And here is a typical "wipe out" when someone tries to get across them.

The kids love the show so much, that after they watch it, they like to set up their own "wipeout zone" obstacle course in the house and try to get across it.

Above you can see Zach walking across the "scary high wall" in our apartment in Colorado.

Below, is a little movie from before we left Austin. This was just after they had watched the show for the very first time...

Big boo-boo

What would a summer trip be if Zach were not immediately injured in some way? :-) On the first Sunday evening (Father's day) that we were at CSU, we went out for a walk. Zach and Bella went running and he promptly tripped and did a face plant on the sidewalk. That would have been bad enough, but since Bella was right behind him, she tripped over his legs that were up in the air and landed on top of him, scooting him down the concrete on his face and removing a copious amount of skin from the forehead and nose. He got up crying so hard, no sound was coming out. We took him back inside and bandaged him all up. He looked GREAT for his first day of Childcare. :-)

We eventually did go back out to walk and then Isabella tripped too. She did not do a face plant though, just scraped up her knees and hands real good. Zach has since recovered and has healed all up- except the spot on his forehead is still a little pink. I hope it doesn't leave a scar.

Father's day

More catch up... Father's day happened on the 2nd day we were in Fort Collins. We were not ready to go to church yet, having just arrived the night before after 3 days of traveling, so we slept in and had a relaxed morning. Then, we went looking for someplace to eat and ended up going to Red Lobster (one of my favorites.) We had a great time.

Blogging catch-up: Isabella's Birthday

I'm trying to catch up on some blogging and realized that I never put pictures from Isabella's 5th birthday party on the blog. So, here is a picture of her and her friends at the party and the video of the "Happy Birthday" song. She had a great time at her princess party.

Sweet Dreams

The previous picture I had posted quit working, so I put up a different (and better) one.

The kids have been sleeping in one bed this summer while we are out in Fort Collins. Tonight I went in to check on them and found them like this. I thought it was too cute to pass up a picture. They have been doing great going to "school" every weekday for the last week and a half. They really enjoy it- and they are worn out at the end of the day and go to sleep quickly! It's been nice.

Finally.. back to blogging!

About 2 weeks ago the video card on my computer went out. I looked online and found out that it was a known problem with the video card manufacturer and they would fix it for free. What they didn't tell me was that I'd be without my computer for almost 2 weeks!

So, we've been busy in Colorado but unable to blog for most of the time. We have lots of pictures to share, but I'll have to keep uploading them as I get time. For now, I'm going to upload 4 little movies from our 4th of July adventure. We went to Colorado Springs for the day. We had a picnic at the Garden of the Gods, then went to "The North Pole" amusement park and, when the rain came in buckets, we decided to go up Pikes Peak. If you've ever wondered what it would be like to drive through large thunderheads, I can give you a first hand account. :-)

For now, here are some little movies:

This one was lunch at the Garden of the Gods...

Zach and Isabella riding a ride at the North Pole...

On the way back down from the summit of Pike's Peak, we ran in to some non-typical 4th of July weather...